It was only a matter of time before social media tools would work their way into becoming a contributing part of the sales process for organizations.

Over the past few months, our developers at CampaignerCRM have been hard at work analyzing how salespeople and customers use social media and how it can help the effectiveness of the overall sales process. We’ve recently added some brand new social media functions to our software to reflect these emerging patterns.

It would be selfish (and unsocial!) to keep this research to ourselves and not share how you can benefit from this fast-growing and ever-changing new business resource. So here are four specific ways your organization can leverage the latest social media tools and improve your bottom line.

1. Prospecting

It may be true that picking up and dialing a phone is still the best way to get in front of prospects, but that doesn’t mean social media doesn’t have it’s uses. What does your organization sell? I can guarantee you there is a LinkedIn group or Facebook page out there somewhere devoted to the subject. These groups are likely to include some people who are looking for what you’re trying to sell.

Why not reach out to them and offer your support and expertise? Establishing yourself as a useful resource is a strong step in the right direction. You can also use Twitter’s search function to search for keywords associated with pains some people have that might bring them to the solution you’re selling.

2.Pre-call research

Social media tools make pre-call research easy, and your prospects know this. They are likely to consider an unprepared sales call as an ill-informed, out of touch sales rep, and they aren't going to want to buy from them!

Check out LinkedIn before you pick up that phone to make sure you have the right person you are trying to reach. You might even discover that you have mutual acquaintances, which can be a huge help to gaining a prospect's trust. Also consider signing up for Google Alerts to stay in touch with the latest news on what's happening with their organization. The more prepared and well-informed you are, the easier it's going to be to gain that prospect's trust in you, which should ultimately lead to more closed deals.

3.Following-up

Having trouble contacting a prospect by phone or email? It’s very likely that they are bombarded on a daily basis with telephone calls and emails, many of which are probably from your competitors. Why not try going where the competition isn’t and message them on LinkedIn or Facebook?

Since you don’t want to just follow up for the sake of just “checking in”, use features within the social network to hand off a helpful resource or share something that makes the contact memorable. It works!

4.Maintaining long lasting relationships with customers

Building relationships with customers has always been critical, and the most successful salespeople do what they can to maintain long lasting relationships with their customers. If you developed a strong relationship with a customer, what better way to keep in touch with them by adding them to your LinkedIn network, following them on Twitter or even adding them as a friend on Facebook? This greatly increases your chances of discovering new opportunities with that customer via upsells, referrals or new selling opportunities if they take on a position within a different organization.

Put it all together and social media can give you a significantly wider perspective on your customer in addition to helping you find new opportunities. Take a good look at how they affect each aspect of your sales process – from prospecting to post-sale. And as these tools continue to evolve, keep your eye open for many more ways you can incorporate them into your sales process to give you an edge.

For a while now, you have probably been seeing news stories about the importance of Social CRM. CRM, (Customer Relationship Management), has become well understood by many in the business world. Certainly even more people know what Social Media is, but what exactly is Social CRM? Having worked at both a Social Media company, Mzinga, and a CRM company, CampaignerCRM, I think I have a pretty good perspective on the promises of the Social CRM buzz.

At its foundation, Social CRM is the integration of CRM applications, marketing, sales and support, with the tools, properties and content found in social media sites. But which tools, properties and content are right for your business?

I recently looked behind one of the share buttons you see on nearly every large website these days. That button allowed me to share an article on over 300 social media sites! Does that mean I need my CRM system to be able to connect to each and every one of these sites? Fortunately for your vendor and for you, the answer is no. What you need is a CRM system that will connect with the social media sites that are going to help you find, sell and maintain your customers.

Let me use an example that illustrates a real world use case for Social CRM. Let’s say you sell widgets to Tom at the ABC company every several months. You have worked hard to cultivate a relationship with Tom and he is an important customer to you. One day, Tom decides to leave the ABC company because there is more opportunity at the XYZ company. If Tom is active in LinkedIn, he probably updated his profile to reflect his new job and title. He may have even tweeted about this change. The fact that Tom left the ABC company is important to you. First, Tom may want to buy widgets from you for the XYZ company. Second, you need to start building your relationship with Tom’s replacement at the ABC company so that you can continue to sell them widgets. A Social CRM, a CRM system that is integrated with LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook, will help you gain access to this information.

This is just one example and other social media properties have good use cases as well. Facebook is promoting Fan pages that companies are currently using as mini websites for their company. It’s important for you to understand where in the social media world people are discussing, commenting or complaining about your company, product or service. These are the sites that are important to your business and it is here that you will be able to leverage the power of social media with your CRM.